untie the balloons from around my neck and ground me
by kinneyobrien
Summary: In hindsight Matt should have known that something was wrong with Severide from day one.


_**i.**_

In hindsight Matt should have known that something was wrong with Severide from day one. Matt remembers how he kept rubbing at his shoulder at the funeral, wincing when he lifted the casket and helped pull it from the hearse. At the time Matt had been grieving, placing a lot of the blame on Kelly's and his own shoulders so he hadn't thought of it. He hadn't _cared_to think of it because they had just buried their best friend—if Severide was injured he'd do the right thing and talk to Boden. And in the coming weeks when Kelly didn't talk to Boden he started to seem just fine, a little more aggressively angry towards Matt, but he seemed fine.

But for all of their years of friendship and teasing amongst rigs he should have known that something was wrong. He should have seen that Kelly was clearly dealing with pain that wasn't just about his dead best friend.

Matt wonders how long it would have taken him to see that Kelly was shooting up in the firehouse bathroom had they not been mourning Andy. Matt thinks that maybe Andy would have seen it from the second it started; would have taken one look at Kelly and called him out on the narcotics and pain killers immediately, would have just _known_instinctually. He never understood Kelly and Andy's bond, he respected it, but he never understood their closeness. They had grown up together, sure, but Matt just didn't understand friendship like theirs.

To Matt's credit he did notice _something_was wrong, and he did try to talk to Kelly about it, but he just kept pushing him away. _Do you think I need your help?_Matt shakes his head, clutching the blister pack in his hand and closing his eyes tightly. Had he just pushed further, had he just tried harder maybe he could have gotten something from Severide. Maybe not a 'I've been taking drugs' confession, but he could have seen that_something more than their constant feuding_wasn't the sole cause of Kelly's irritability.

It isn't until the incident in the bathroom that Matt's eyes are pried open. Kelly acts like nothing is going on while they both clean up, but Matt can see the almost immediate change. From a despondent, upset, clearly in pain Kelly Severide to the cocky asshole who emerges from the bathroom stall ten minutes later. And the pieces all fall into place fairly quickly. He watches him leave and for the rest of the day Kelly seems fine. The next day he's in pain again, grasping at his shoulder after each and every call, but around lunch time he's back in the bathroom for ten minutes and when he emerges back into the kitchen, he's back to the old Kelly again. And for a few moments Kelly acts like _Kelly-before-Andy's-death._

Kelly even laughs at a joke that Casey tells. Kelly who, up until a few weeks ago, was calling him a murderer.

Matt goes to Shay, because if anyone is going to give him something to take away the pain it's going to be Shay. She seems offended at the accusation at first, but her gaze wavers when he reminds her of the damage that this could do to the squad; how he, _they_, are putting lives in danger every single day by keeping quiet. So she cracks, caves in and tells him the entire story.

Shay tells him it was just Toradol at first; nothing too strong, something to ease the tension and inflammation in his shoulder and back. She didn't know the real injury then, and had only given him a few bottles over a few weeks. That it wasn't even addictive, but somehow with an increase in pain the Toradol wasn't enough and he'd stopped coming to her when she refused to give him something stronger. Matt never really knew Anna; he never really got too invested in girlfriends of Kelly's before or after the first Renee, but he remembers something about her being into pharmaceuticals and when one of the guys offhandedly mentions her Matt's vision blurs for a moment and he feels a wave of nausea pass over him.

He remembers Severide's locker combination, _remembers Darden's too,_like he knows the back of his hand. He breaks into Kelly's locker relatively easily, and at first he doesn't find anything weird or suspicious. There's nothing incriminating out in the open on his shelves or tucked into his shaving kit, but before he slams the locker door closed he glances down at Kelly's overnight bag and the light catches on the silver packet peaking out from under a spare pair of basketball shorts.

Matt quickly pulls it out, closes Kelly's locker before anyone sees him, and hurries back to his office. He doesn't recognize the packaging, and there's no distinct labels on it to identify the pills inside. They're white and round and look pretty generic so he sends a picture message to Heather in hopes that she'd know. What she sends back twenty minutes later sends a chill down his spine.

_'__dilaudid. those aren't a game, matt.'_

_**ii.**_

"So… what? Are you pimping yourself out for narcotics now?" Matt asks angrily, doesn't wait for a hello before pushing his way into Kelly's apartment. Kelly doesn't look surprised, or angry, and when Matt really looks at him properly Kelly doesn't even look like he's all there at the moment in the first place. His eyes are shiny and there's a half dozen bottles of beer littering the coffee table. "Jesus, Kel, please tell me you're not drinking when you take these?" He tosses the blister packs onto the coffee table next to the empty bottles.

"What?" Kelly finally asks, less of a question so he blurts it out again more adamantly when Matt looks at him with sympathy and concern. "Where did you—did you _break into my locker_?"

There's a moment when Matt thinks Kelly is going to hit him, but Matt plants his feet and crosses his arms over his chest and waits for his answer, "Well?"

"Fuck you, Casey. Get the hell out of my house."

"Do I need to call 911 or take you to an emergency room?" Kelly grunts and drops down onto the couch, but doesn't give him any of the answers that he wants. "Fine I'm calling Shay and Dawson."

Kelly doesn't protest, barely can even move from his spot rooted to the couch, but lurches forward when he suddenly remembers the pills on the coffee table. Matt's already dialed Dawson's number when he turns back to Severide and finds him popping another pill into his mouth.

"Are you kidding me?" Casey grabs the pack of pills from Severide's hands and tosses them clear across the room towards the kitchen.

"Didn't I tell you to leave?" Kelly says, but Matt has the phone back to his ear so Kelly just grabs the half empty beer he had been drinking before Matt showed up.

"Are you trying to kill yourself? Is that what this is? I know you're in pain—" Kelly scoffs, or laughs, Matt can't really tell at this point anymore. Matt pockets his phone and crouches down to level himself with Kelly's face. "—I know that okay and maybe that's what this started out as, but Andy wouldn't—"

Kelly grabs Matt by the collar of his shirt and pushes him backwards onto the coffee table so hard that he can feel the bottles breaking underneath him, "Don't you _dare_talk about him you son of a—"

"Kelly!" Matt knows Shay's voice anywhere, and she crosses the room from the door to the couch in three strides. She wraps her hands around Kelly's fist, trying to soothe him and when Kelly's hand finally relaxes she pushes him back onto the couch and turns to help Matt to his feet.

"Are you okay?" Dawson asks, clearly concerned.

"I'm fine," Matt says and shakes off her hand on his arm. "Just a scratch. I'm more worried about him. I don't know how much he's taken or what he's been drinking, but he's pretty out of it."

Shay checks his blood pressure and pulse, eyeing her roommate and friend as he drifts in and out of consciousness., "We should get him to the hospital. His blood pressure is dropping."

Matt's eyes dart between Shay and Dawson, who both look even more worried than he does, but Dawson is the first to leap into action, radioing into the hospital warning of an impending overdose. It's all a haze to Matt, how they got from the apartment to the hospital until Herrmann sits down next to him in the waiting room. He's the first to arrive, and it takes Matt a moment to vaguely remember Severide writing down Herrmann as his emergency contact.

"I hate these damn waiting room chairs," he gripes, and while he sounds annoyed, his eyes betray the worry and concern that he's actually feeling. "Did you—"

"No," Matt replies, not even needing to hear the question. But he whispers as an afterthought, "I had my suspicions."

Herrmann pauses and just when Matt thinks the conversation is over he sighs, "I did too." Herrmann squeezes his shoulder and offers to go get coffee for everyone. Dawson had called Boden after they arrived so Matt patiently awaits their arrival, already dreading the questions and comments that was soon to come.

_**iii.**_

Matt thought they would arrive in waves, but after shift is over everyone comes all at once. Dawson and Shay are still missing in action, having briefly gone back with the doctors to explain. Boden looks serious, obviously concerned too, but he looks serious. Serious and angry. Matt can't really blame him because he's seriously angry and concerned too.

"Anything?" Herrmann asks when he comes back from the vending machine, coffee cups stacked up three high as if he anticipated the entire squad arriving while he was gone. He hands one to Matt and then passes off the rest.

"Not yet."

Dawson emerges, without Shay, fifteen minutes later. She looks tired, her eyes rimmed bright red, and she looks paler than he's ever seen her. "He's not out of the woods, but they had to pump his stomach."

"Did he just drink too much?" Cruz asks, and Matt sighs heavily.

"He can't have visitors besides Boden and Shay tonight, but he's out of it anyway," Dawson says, directing her gaze towards Matt.

"I'm not going anywhere," Matt says and there's a roar of agreement behind him. They all settle in, and after a while it's mostly quiet and people start to doze off.

Matt can't sleep though so Herrmann retakes his seat next to him and leans against Matt's shoulder, "I saw Shay giving him something. A week or so after Andy—" Herrmann cringes. "I didn't think anything of it, but I should have."

Matt sighs, for what feels like the hundredth time that night, "We all missed it."

Shay emerges sometime after midnight looking worse than when Dawson did. Casey sends Herrmann home with the promise to call if anything changes, because if anyone deserves to go home it's the man with almost half of a baseball team of kids. "Anything new?" She yawns, curling up in Herrmann's vacated chair, facing Casey's.

"This is my fault," she says softly. "If I hadn't—"

"This isn't—right now we have to focus on Severide," he replies, though he wants to yell and scream at her for her part in this mess even though a part of him knows it's not entirely all her fault. "We'll make sure he's okay."

_**iv.**_

He can have visitors the next morning. Boden goes first and when he leaves the hospital room he looks more angry than when he went in. Severide refuses to see anyone else until mid-afternoon and even then Casey is the only person on the list. The other guys don't seem to mind, they just want to know that he's okay. Kelly is dressed when Casey works up the courage to go inside. He's pulling on a pair of black sweatpants with the hospital logo on the pant leg.

"Guess they had to cut off my jeans," Kelly says and a smile spreads across his face.

"This is all a joke to you, isn't it? Almost dying, us almost losing _another—_this is all just a damn joke to you."

"Fuck you, Casey," Kelly says, but there's no heat behind his words. He's not smiling anymore though. "All I want is a ride and then you can fuck right off."

"Are you even supposed to leave?"

"Signed out AMA. Pretty sure I pissed off Shay."

"And Boden by the looks of things."

"Suspended indefinitely," Kelly says with a huff. "Or 'extended leave' as he called it, but we all know what that really means."

When Kelly tries to pass him Matt presses a hand to his chest and pushes him back a step or two, "You need _help,_ Kelly."

"And you can either be my ride home or get out of my way," Kelly says and pushes past Matt into the hallway. When Matt comes out the entire squad is hovering by the door, a mixture of shock and concern etched on their faces.

"Lieutenant?" one of them, Matt thinks it's Mills but the tears are blurring his vision and it feels like he's under water, so he's not sure.

"You fucking bastard. _You fucking bastard._What would Andy say, huh? What would he say if he saw you pulling this shit and _throwing away your career_you selfish son of a bitch?" Matt grabs Kelly's arm but Kelly spins on his heels and shoves Matt backwards. If it hadn't been for Mills he would have fallen on his ass.

"What would Andy _say_? He can't say anything Matt because _he's dead and it's our fault,_" Kelly seethes, face contorted in pain and anguish, and then he turns on his heels again and walks away.


End file.
